More than 20 audit firms are participating in the program, including Blocksec, Cetora, Hacken, Quantstamp, and Immunefi.
Ethereum News
The Ethereum Foundation announced on Tuesday that it is committing $1 million to subsidize security audits for blockchain developers building on Ethereum. The initiative is called the Ethereum Security Subsidy Program and was launched in partnership with digital asset advisory firm Areta. Areta operates an audit marketplace that connects Ethereum builders with vetted professional security firms.
More than 20 audit firms are participating in the program, including Blocksec, Cetora, Hacken, Quantstamp, and Immunefi. Projects selected for funding can receive subsidies covering up to 30% of their audit costs. New cohorts of recipients will be chosen every month by an expert committee that includes teams from Chainlink and Ethereum execution client Nethermind.
The program is open to all Ethereum mainnet builders regardless of their project size or development stage. Applicants submit their projects for review, and selected teams receive funding applied directly through Areta's platform. The Ethereum Foundation said on X that security audits are a recognized industry best practice but remain expensive for many teams to access.
The foundation has set specific criteria for evaluating applicants. Projects must demonstrate technical merit, a genuine commitment to building on Ethereum, a strong track record, and clear feasibility. The program also prioritizes projects aligned with what the foundation calls its CROPS principles.
CROPS stands for censorship resistance, open source, privacy, and security. The foundation published this framework last month as a guide for how applications should be built and evaluated across the Ethereum ecosystem. The Ethereum Security Subsidy Program is positioned as an extension of those principles into practical funding.
The new program sits within the foundation's broader Trillion Dollar Security initiative, which launched last year to raise the network's security standards as it scales to handle more complex applications and greater on-chain value. Areta CEO Fin Boothroyd said the program brings together top-tier audit providers and leading ecosystem organizations to strengthen the blockchain's security posture.
Areta previously ran a comparable $1 million audit subsidy program for Solana developers. Separately, Aave Labs announced last month that it is launching a $1.5 million audit program focused on securing the recently released Aave V4 protocol. The parallel efforts reflect growing industry attention to smart contract security across multiple blockchain ecosystems.
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